Social Question

Have you ever become the very person you used to judge and criticize?

Maybe you used to sit back and judge a parent with a screaming child and now your child is the one screaming. Or, was negative about gay people and now your own child is gay. Maybe you used to judge people who got divorced and now you are getting one. Could be anything, anything you judged or felt you would never do, and now find yourself in the very position you never thought you would be in.

When you found yourself in that place, were you hard on yourself? What was your thought process?

21 Answers

Used to be a bible belt Baptist and judged atheists, anyone who wasn’t conservative, and anyone whose sexual orientation deviated from heterosexual. And then I grew up and found myself to be an atheist, politically centrist, and bisexual-ish (Kinsey scale 1 or 2, though I usually just say 1.5)

Today I posted a selfie on my (work) Facebook page. I hate selfies and I judge every one that pops up in my newsfeed!!! My one had a dog in it and it was really their selfie, I just happened to be the one with the camera!!!

- I used to think old people were just confused with all of their talk about “Well at least I have my health.” Now I understand, and want almost nothing more than my “health”. – When I was real young, I was a real anti-tax, anti-immigrant conservative racist who agreed with my father that the liberal environmentalists on our street were awful people. Now I’m that awful person – and some. – There was a time when I would hate people who would vote the “lesser of 2 evils” rather than vote for the person who best represents your positions and vision for the country. Now I am that pathetic self-described pragmatist that votes for the lesser evil. – My anti-woo reflex was so strong for such a long time that I would get sick by the thought that sane people were engaged in meditation or yoga. It took a lot for me to drop this long enough to realize that there really is benefit, and the science confirms this. I find that I am now capable of giving extended informal dharma talks that would make the former me want to vomit. – Prior to getting married, I was convinced that I would never get married because it was a useless concept. If commitment was genuine, a contract should be redundant. I ended up really wanting to get married and have kids, and I have no idea why. My former self would have really given me shit for that. – I had no idea what it would be like to be a parent, so I had all kinds of ideas and beliefs about what my life would be like. I turned out to be an entirely different type of parent – one that I likely considered to be pathetic when I was younger.

There are also plenty of other positions that I held that I no longer do. I consider this a good thing. If there is a “me”, the “me” of 17 years old wouldn’t recognize “me” now. And I do not regret it at all. If “I” am the same person I am today in 10 years, I’ll be terribly disappointed. I look forward to becoming something I loathe today and realizing that it’s ok.

I used to think that depressed people facing problems were just weak willed and not trying hard enough to overcome their adversities. Well..heh…I’m there now. After losing everything last year, home, savings, work, a 60% cut in salary, I am fighting serous depression.
Feeling trapped in my circumstance, negative about my future and have little motivation to pull myself up by my bootstraps again at age 54. Actually though, it is not so much lack of spirit as it is just the cold, hard, facts of reality. There are no more endless years to build on and most of my depression has to do with reality not just feeling sorry for myself..

I’ve noticed for most of my life that the things that I most detest in others are… the things that I do.

There’s a guy in my office who is a “loud talker” ... so I try to moderate my speech. He also goes on at extreme length on the most pointless explanations of inconsequential nonsense, so… ah, this is my stop.

Yes. I think it’s inevitable. It’s our shadow self, and a part of who we are, or we could not recognize it in others. It used to annoy me when that happened, until I realized it’s just part of being human, and happens to all of us. Accept it and carry on.

Yes. There are many things and I call it growth. The less we know about a subject the more likely we are to reject it. As we age hopefully we continue to grow in knowledge and learn to become more tolerant. It isn’t being a hypocrite but simply becoming more knowledgeable.
I use to be against gay marriage of course because of my own religious belief that only a man and a woman should marry. But then I put myself in their shoes and realized that I would hate for anyone to tell me who I could or could not marry. There are still countries that perform arrange marriages and the women have no choice and are carted off like cattle. We are all entitled to seek our own happiness and love is something that should be free for all to try to persue. It won’t hurt society. If anything I think it will help society.